Don’t fixate. You promised him, remember?
Blah. Introspection was bollocks anyway.
I forced my eyes all the way open and focused on Saint still doing his best impression of a green-eyed statue. “Um... morning? I think?”
My voice was hoarse.
Saint handed me a mug of lemon-balm tea. Then held up his phone and pointed to the message he’d typed out on the screen.
Saint:hospital. rubi did a bunk so i’m taking u
“Cam chasing him around?”
Saint shrugged. I took it as a yes and sat up while he tapped at his screen again, reaching for my own phone.
It was as silent as Saint, no messages outside of club business, and even those were mundane as hell. The cement order was on time and the new bucket trowels had arrived.Yawn. It was perverted as hell that I kind of missed when fighting Crows had been a full-time job.
A job that nearly killed you, Saint, Cam, and Rubi.
Yeah. Okay. It was wrong. But still. Cement orders? Was it too much to fucking ask to wake up to a sign from Mateo that he was thinking of me as much as I was thinking about him?
Saint brandished his phone again. I read the message and rolled my eyes. “Ten o’clock. Got it. I’ll be ready. Man, how are you worse than Cam without opening your mouth?”
Humour danced in Saint’s gaze. He even grinned, and it wasn’t the worst thing in the world to start the day with.
He left. I hauled myself out of bed and drifted, out of habit, to the window. The yard was busy with brothers coming and going, collecting building supplies from the yard, messing with their bikes in the rudimentary garage Nash had round the back of the compound.
A couple were going a few rounds in the ring, sparring in the early morning sun.
I watched them scrap while I searched out a clean towel. They were strong fighters. Useful, even. But they weren’t good enough to hold my attention and I thought of Mateo instead. He was brutal in the ring, so natural with raw violence that he didn’t seem real. Sometimes it took two brothers to stop him. Cam and Saint. Rubi and Nash.
Only I could restrain him with my voice alone. And I didn’t do it often, because I loved watching him fight. Those rare moments when the fire in him had purpose were beautiful and I was too selfish to give them up, even for a brother.
With Mateo on my mind, I took a shower in the bathroom we shared with Nash, tidying it up with one hand and scrubbing shampoo through my hair with the other. It was Mateo’s turn to clean the small space, but he hadn’t been around, and it was messy enough for Orla to get lairy.
“I’m not your mother, any of you. Get this shit cleaned up before I break some balls.”
Fair warning, Cam’s sister was scarier than any of us, even Mateo.
All cleaned out, I dug through the fresh clothes I’d piled on my chest of drawers the night before. Half of them were Mateo’s, naturally, and it was too easy to tug one of his T-shirts over my head, rolling the sleeves to fit my shorter arms. Couldn’t get away with it with his jeans, and wearing his underwear was... no. But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t slide my feet into a pair of his socks too.
Then I sat on the edge of my bed and typed out a text I’d never send.
Embry:I hate it when you’re not here.
The text I did send?
Embry:No fucking fighting.
Because Mateo was the kind of man who needed reminding on the regular. With me he had the patience of a dad with six kids. The rest of the world, not so much.
I wasn’t expecting a reply. Mateo was driving the night shifts and should’ve been sleeping, but a message buzzed through a minute later.
Mateo:only think I’m fighting is craptastic maccy D’s coffee
The typo made me smile. In a room with Cam, Rubi, and Saint, and now Alexei too, it was easy to mistake him for a man less bright than the rest of them. But he was sharper than anyone knew, and he only made grammatical mistakes like that when he was tired.
Embry:Get some rest.
